


Last of the Magicians

by lamardeuse



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-29
Updated: 2010-04-29
Packaged: 2017-10-09 05:34:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/83593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lamardeuse/pseuds/lamardeuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Newton had it all wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Last of the Magicians

**Author's Note:**

> For moxie_brown, who asked for fic with the words Cartesian, alchemy and insouciance.

“It kinda looks like a toaster oven,” John said.

Rodney slapped his hand away when he tried to open the small door on the front of the device, which really did bear a striking resemblance to a toaster oven except for the complex Ancient touchpad covering the top. 

“Ow,” John muttered, rubbing at the back of his hand for effect.

“We don’t know what it does yet.  Just leave it be.”

John took another bite of his turkey sandwich.  Damn, he’d almost forgotten what real turkey tasted like.  “Just open the door.”

“Yes, why didn’t I think of that?” Rodney sneered.  “_Just open the door._  And what will we do when the four horsemen of the Apocalypse come galloping out, hm?”

John eyed the box skeptically; it was no more than a foot across on any one side.  “They’d have to be pretty tiny horses,” he drawled.

Rodney rolled his eyes and stalked off to go talk to Zelenka – probably to tell him to stop playing with the Ancient toys over in his corner.  More than a little miffed, and feeling somewhat mischievous – there were no Wraith ships on the horizon for a change, nobody had died this week, and hey, _real turkey _– John made sure that Rodney’s back was turned before taking his half-eaten sandwich and quickly stuffing it inside the Ancient device.  He’d get at least a solid five seconds of amusement out of the befuddled look on Rodney’s face when he finally opened the door and found it.

He shut the door carefully, and the device _clunked _softly.

Then it screamed.

“What did you do?  What did you do?” Rodney yelled over the high-pitched sound, running back with his hands clapped over his ears.

When the screaming died, John opened the door again and pulled out a thin block of what looked like platinum in the exact shape of his turkey sandwich.

“Crap,” John muttered, turning it over in his hands.  “That was the last one.”

    
    
    
    
 

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

    
    
    
    
 

  
It was on the tip of his tongue.  “I know it was a George somebody.  George Washington, nope, George Harrison, definitely nope…”

Rodney pressed his knuckles to the spot between his eyes.  “Would you please…”

“George Costanza!” John crowed, starting to enjoy this way too much.

“Yes, George Costanza, the legendary alchemist,” Rodney bit out, his expression reaching whole new plateaus of insouciance.  “Who actually discovered a way to turn bagels into _zinc_.”  He picked up the toaster oven-cum-philosopher’s stone and hefted it under one arm.

“I don’t see the point of that,” John muttered.  “I’d rather have the bagel.”

“Yes, whereas turkey sandwiches and platinum – oh, just give it to me,” Rodney snapped, making grabby motions with his free hand.  John sighed and gave up his platinum sandwich.

“Newton!”  John called, as Rodney was halfway out the door.  “That’s it!”

Rodney turned back.  “George _Newton_?”

John grinned and shrugged.  “Okay, maybe it wasn’t George.” 

Rodney cast a why-me glance at the ceiling, then stomped off toward his quarters with the Ancient device under one arm.  John decided to follow him, because apart from the whole loss of the turkey sandwich aspect, this afternoon was turning out to be _fun_.

    
    
    
    
 

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

    
    
    
    
 

  
“So what’s the verdict?”

Rodney’s teeth released their grip on his knuckle.  “I don’t know yet.”

John leaned over his shoulder to get a look at the laptop screen.  He knew just enough chemistry to be dangerous, and he bet Rodney didn’t know a hell of a lot more.  “Why don’t we turn this over to the right people?” he said finally, because as fun as this was it looked like a blood vessel in Rodney’s forehead was about to burst. 

John’s hand was halfway to slapping his comm pack when Rodney’s hand shot out to grip his arm.  “No, no, we can’t do that, are you crazy?  Do you have any idea what this is?”

“An Ancient device that steals people’s sandwiches?”

Rodney flapped the metal brick with John’s bite marks embedded in it at him.  “And turns them into precious and valuable substances worth hundreds of dollars!”

John pointed.  “Give that back.”

“Exactly!” Rodney said, vindicated.

“No, really,” said John.

    
    
    
    
 

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

    
    
    
    
 

  
Eventually, John persuaded Rodney to try some different substances in the device, and they tested:  Rodney’s pen, the duct tape from John’s pack, and a piece of chocolate from Rodney’s stash.  That last one was the hardest, not because of the mysterious workings of the machine but because getting Rodney to part with a specimen big enough to be seen by the naked eye was next to impossible.  Every time, the device turned them into something different, and – at least to them – something completely unpredictable.  Even though Rodney could read the Ancient writing on the touchpad, he took a surprisingly cautious approach to experimentation.

“Okay,” John said finally, after the device had turned the chocolate into a small handful of what looked like emeralds, “so, no real pattern, then.”

“Nothing that I can determine – yet,”  Rodney said, now eyeing the machine like a formidable enemy.

“Rodney, call the chemists or I will.”

“I can do this!” Rodney snarled.  He looked up at John, a weird mixture of fear, anger and worry in his eyes, and something clicked into place inside John’s head. 

“What’s the worst you think will happen if you let this go?” he asked softly.

Rodney shook his head.  “You don’t understand.  This is one of the most enduring myths of science.  Some of the greatest minds in history – like Tycho Brahe and _Isaac _Newton – wasted huge chunks of their lives on the wild goose chase of alchemy.”

“And now we’ve found the wild goose,” John said carefully. 

“You think that makes it _better_?” Rodney demanded.  “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m in charge of the most brilliant minds the planet Earth has to offer.  Do you think I want them abandoning everything to spend years figuring out how to make gold from sandwiches?”

John raised an eyebrow.  “Don’t you think you’re overreacting a little?”

But Rodney only shook his head again.  “No.”  His gaze was open and imploring in a way that it hadn’t been since the Arcturus fiasco, and John was so surprised that Rodney was actually asking for something again – even silently – that he heard himself say:

“Okay.  Let’s keep at it a while longer.”

Rodney’s eyes widened, surprise transforming his features, and John felt something inside him shift and rearrange itself, old patterns yielding to new alignments.

    
    
    
    
 

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

    
    
    
    
 

  
“Try the popcorn again.”

“Which kind?”

“Extra butter.”

Rodney opened the door and peered inside.  “We’re making a mess in there.”

John leaned in.  “Yeah,” he said, unconcerned.  He leaned back, rearranging the pillow behind him.  By this time of night, even Rodney’s torture rack of a mattress was starting to feel inviting.  They were sitting side by side against the wall, Rodney near the head of the bed, John near the middle, their feet jutting out the side, the magic toaster oven wedged between them.

Shrugging, Rodney stuffed a couple of pieces of popcorn in his mouth, then chucked another couple of pieces into the machine.  There was a brief scream, almost a hiccup, and when Rodney opened the door again, he drew out two small puffs made of pure gold.

“Cool,” John breathed.  And then he looked up at Rodney and sucked in a breath, because Rodney wasn’t looking at the gold, Rodney was looking at him, and man, Newton and all those other dead geniuses hadn’t known a damned thing, because _this _was the secret they should have spent half their lives searching for.

Rodney held his gaze for a long moment, then reached out.  While John stared down stupidly, Rodney’s fingers circled his wrist, urged the hand to turn over, and dropped one of the gold kernels into his open palm.

And just like that he was suddenly, almost painfully aware of his every thought, careening off the walls of his skull and redrawing the Cartesian map of his existence. 

_I am_, he thought, with the inescapable certainty of gravity.  _I am._

“You figured it out,” John murmured.

Rodney swallowed and nodded.  “We figured it out,” he said roughly. 

The corner of the box dug into John’s ribs as he leaned sideways, falling into newness, bones and heart and blood seeking a magic that turned popcorn into a promise. 

    
 

  
    _     Newton was not the first of the age of reason, he was the last of the magicians._  
                                                                                                                                                 
                                                                                                                                             - John Maynard Keynes 

**Author's Note:**

> The "George" exchange is basically a rip-off of a conversation between luvhandlz and myself, and the fact that it translates so easily into a conversation between John and Rodney just further proves that they are so in love.
> 
> First published February 2006.


End file.
